


a burden too great to carry alone

by agapi42



Category: The Worst Witch (TV 2017)
Genre: F/F, Fake/Pretend Relationship, Hackle Summer Trope Challenge, Help I'm In Love, au because there's no way I can make this work with canon as presented in Selection Day, but oh well, this is the fluffiest thing I have written in years
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-11
Updated: 2018-06-11
Packaged: 2019-05-21 04:19:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,246
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14908205
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/agapi42/pseuds/agapi42
Summary: Agatha claims to have found an old decree of the Magic Council that will force Ada to accept her back into the school. Ada has another way out.





	a burden too great to carry alone

**Author's Note:**

> So I've watched both series in just under a week. I love it lots and I love this ship and here is a fic. Hello! Unbetaed so all mistakes are my own: please point them out so I can correct them.

Agatha shook her head. “I didn’t come to apologise. I came to give _you_ the chance to apologise.”

Ada resisted the temptation to sigh and drop her head in her hands. Of course not. Of course Agatha wouldn’t ever admit to having been in the wrong. Of course she wouldn’t attempt a reconciliation that wasn’t on her terms. Ada glanced down at her hands, clasped on the desk in front of her, and back up, where Agatha was still looking at her expectantly.

“Agatha,” she began, choosing her words carefully, “while I am sorry about how things turned out, I maintain—”

Agatha held up her hand. “If I could stop you there, sister dear. There’s something I think you should see before you finish that sentence.”

She produced a piece from parchment from thin air and slid it across the desk to Ada before settling back in her chair with a smirk.

 _The Headmistress shall marry before fifty years of age,_ Ada read, _for the Academy be a burden too great to carry alone. If she be not married by one-and-fifty, the Council shall select a partner to ensure the school’s stability..._

 “I’ve never seen this before.” Not an outright accusation, at least, but _honestly_...

Agatha waved a dismissive hand. “I came across it years ago. It wasn’t relevant then, of course, not to Mother and not if we were to run the school together. But it’s just you now, alone, and we’re fifty-one next week. Consider it an early present.”

“Agatha, if I were to take this to the Magic Council, what do you think they would do?”

Agatha looked up from examining her fingernails. “I really don’t know, Ada.” She leaned forward, her smirk widening. “Shall we try it and see?”

Had the Magic Council ever been idiotic enough to legislate over this? If they had, once reminded, would they try to force her in line with it? Agatha was betting she would take the safer route, appointing her joint Headmistress once more and avoiding the question altogether. She _couldn’t..._

“I don’t think that’ll be necessary,” Ada said.

“I knew you’d see sense—” Agatha began, smugness spreading across her face.

“It’s not really relevant, given that I am already married.”

Agatha snorted. “And do I know the lucky witch?”

“Indeed you do.” Ada offered up a quick apology to Hecate. “She’s Miss Hardbroom.”

Agatha sat back. “ _Really_.”

“Really.” Ada bent her head over the paperwork in front of her to hide her blush. “Honestly, Agatha, I had no idea you were so obtuse.”

There was a stony silence. Ada turned the page and pretended to read it.

“So, you see,” Ada continued, looking up when she felt her face had cooled and Agatha showed no sign of moving, “I am very much not alone—”

There was a knock at the door.

“Come in!” Agatha called.

“Ada, I...” Hecate stopped just inside the door.

Agatha twisted in her chair to see her. “Well met, Hecate. How lovely to see you. Your wife here was just about to explain why she didn’t invite her family to your wedding.”

Hecate took a couple of steps forward, ignored Agatha’s greeting, her eyes fixed on Ada. “My... wife?”

Ada smiled apologetically at her. “I know we were hoping to keep it a secret a while longer but Agatha here has dragged up some antiquated decree of the Magic Council and I thought it best to tell her.”

Ada held up the parchment; Hecate quickly crossed the room to her side and took it.

“Mother’s going to be terribly disappointed when I tell her you got married without her. Didn’t invite her. Didn’t even mirror her to tell her.”

“It was a small ceremony,” Ada answered, very conscious of Hecate towering at her side. “Just us.”

Hecate dropped the parchment back on the desk. “What arrant nonsense,” she muttered then, louder, to Agatha, “It was what I wanted. We’re planning a larger celebration after the end of term.”

Ada turned her head to smile up at Hecate who smiled back, that small, secretive smile she loved so well.

Agatha’s lip curled. “Impulsive, was it? Doesn’t sound like you, Hecate. You must have lowered your standards. You’re usually so _meticulous._ ”

She made the word sound like an insult. From the way she glared, Ada wondered if there was some history there that Hecate had chosen to spare her.

“Not impulsive at all,” Hecate said coolly. “Carefully considered and well-planned. I know my own heart. I am intimately acquainted with a hundred reasons why Ada is more than worthy of my love and my life and every day I discover more.” Hecate’s hand came to rest on Ada’s shoulder. Ada covered it with her own and held it tightly, grateful beyond measure, then looked up to see Hecate gazing down on her. Her eyes searched her face. “She deserves far more than I can give her but all I have will have to suffice.”

Agatha made a contemptuous sound. “Who, _Ada_?”

“It was not a decision I made lightly,” Hecate said softly, still looking at Ada. Ada wasn’t even sure Agatha heard her. She could hardly hear her over the thumping of her heart. Then Hecate turned back to Agatha. “As you say, I am meticulous. I am not careless or slapdash or uninformed. I, for example—” with a wave of her free hand over the parchment, a shimmering brown haze formed above it; her voice dropped several degrees “—would not forge a document dated 1693 using ink made with compounds invented in the 19th century.”

Agatha’s mouth dropped open. Ada had a sudden urge to lean into Hecate, her tall, lean, black-clad pillar of strength. _Magnificent_ , she thought, _is too small a word_. “So, Agatha, will you tell the Magic Council about this or shall I?”

Agatha scowled and transferred away, utterly failing to respond to Ada’s question.

Ada locked the door with a spell and gave into the temptation, wrapping an arm around Hecate’s hips. Hecate ran her fingers through Ada’s hair.

“Thank you,” Ada said, muffled against the fabric of Hecate’s dress. “Thank you.”

A minute passed in silence before Ada turned her face away to ask clearly, “Do you think that’s the last we’ll see of her this year?”

“I suppose that rather depends on how _inventive_ she’s feeling.”

A pang of regret for what her sister could be, _should_ be. Someone she could trust, a relationship without lies. “I don’t think either of us believed a word the other was saying. Or you.”

Hecate’s hand stilled in her hair and withdrew. “No?”

Feeling the sudden tension in her body, Ada pulled back, taking Hecate’s hands in hers. “She wouldn’t. You heard what she said. She doesn’t think me worthy of that. I don’t quite understand how I am—” Hecate opened her mouth, probably to issue an indignant denial, and Ada hurried on “—but I would like to spend each and every day striving to be, if you’ll let me?”

“You won’t have to try very hard,” Hecate murmured. She looked at Ada, eyes shining, and tugged her to her feet. “I thought I was the one proposing?”

“You didn’t ask a question.”

“It would have looked rather odd in the circumstances.”

“Yes, then.” Ada thought she might split in two from happiness but it was all right—

“Yes, too,” Hecate said softly, and bent to kiss her smiling mouth

— Hecate could always put her back together again.

 


End file.
